There is increasing interest in the development of flexible circuitry for use in a range of devices, including electro-optical arrays and display panels. Proposed solutions for fabricating thin-film transistor (TFT) devices, used in switching and driver circuitry, onto flexible metallic and plastic substrates have not yet met with commercial success, however.
Conventionally, TFT devices have been fabricated on rigid substrates, typically glass or silicon, using a well-known sequence of deposition, patterning and etching steps. For example, amorphous silicon TFT devices require deposition, patterning, and etching of metals, such as aluminum, chromium or molybdenum; of amorphous silicon semiconductors; and of insulators, such as SiO2 or Si3N4, onto a substrate. The semiconductor thin film is formed in layers having typical thicknesses ranging from several nm to several hundred nm, with intermediary layers having thicknesses on the order of a few microns, and may be formed over an insulating surface that lies atop the rigid substrate.
The requirement for a rigid substrate has been based largely on the demands of the fabrication process itself. Rigidity allows the fabrication system to more accurately register the substrate in position for the different process steps. Thermal characteristics are also particularly important. TFT devices are fabricated at relatively high temperatures, making it difficult to work with many types of plastics and with some metals, due to thermal expansion characteristics. Thus far, the range of substrate materials that have been used successfully is somewhat limited, generally to glass, quartz, or other rigid, silicon-based materials.
In prototype work of various workers skilled in the circuit fabrication arts, TFT devices have been formed on some types of metal foil and plastic substrates, indicating that there is at least some measure of flexibility that can be allowed for their fabrication. However, inherent problems include chemical incompatibility between the substrate and TFT materials, thermal expansion mismatch between substrate and device layers, and difficulties with planarity and surface morphology. These problems must be satisfactorily resolved in order to make commercialization a reality. Various problems associated with the difficulty of forming electronic devices on a plastic substrate are discussed in a paper presented by Kim et al on Aug. 19, 2007 at the International Conference on Amorphous and Noncrystalline Semiconductors (ICANS), entitled Performance of a-Si—H n-i-p Photodiodes on Plastic Substrate.
The fabrication process for the TFT can require temperatures typically in the range of 125-300 degrees C. or higher, including temperatures at levels where many types of plastic substrates would be unusable. Thus, it is widely held, as is stated in U.S. Pat. No. 7,045,442 (Maruyama et al.), that a TFT cannot be directly formed on a plastic substrate.
As one alternative solution, U.S. Pat. No. 6,492,026 (Graff et al.) discloses the use of flexible plastic substrates having relatively high glass transition temperatures Tg, typically above 120 degrees C. However, the capability for these substrates to withstand conventional TFT fabrication temperatures much above this range is questionable. Moreover, in order to use these plastics, considerable effort is expended in protecting the substrate and the device(s) formed from scratch damage and moisture permeation, such as using multiple barrier layers. The use of high-performance plastics, as is noted in the Graff et al. '026 disclosure, still leaves thermal expansion difficulties (expressed using Coefficient of Thermal Expansion, CTE). Solutions of this type generally require additional planarization and isolation layers and processes in order to protect the plastic.
One strategy that shows some promise relates to the use of a rigid carrier during fabrication. As one example, in order to provide the benefits of TFT devices mounted on a plastic substrate, the same Maruyama et al. '442 disclosure describes a method that forms the TFT on a release layer that is initially attached to a carrier. Once the TFT circuitry is fabricated, the release layer is then separated from its carrier and can be laminated onto a lighter and more flexible plastic material.
Although this and similar solutions have been proposed for forming TFT components on flexible substrates, drawbacks remain. Lamination of a release layer that is populated with TFT devices, as described in Maruyama et al. '442 requires additional fabrication steps and materials and presents inherent alignment difficulties.
TFT fabrication onto flexible substrates, then, generally requires that the substrate be held on a carrier of some type during the various stages of layer deposition. One of the more important functions of such a carrier is providing dimensional stability to the flexible substrate. Thus, for example, a rigid glass carrier is conventionally provided. As described in Japanese Patent Publication Number JP 7-325297 A2 (Ichikawa), TFT devices can be formed onto a plastic substrate temporarily held to a glass carrier by means of an adhesive layer.
The use of a conventional glass carrier, however, imposes some constraints on the types of flexible substrate materials that can be used. Some types of plastics are compatible with the use of a glass substrate, but can be impractical because they exhibit transition Tg temperatures near the region of temperatures used for deposition. Thus, plastic substrates can tend to soften somewhat, allowing expansion during a fabrication cycle. Metals do not have this disadvantage. However, metallic materials are not as dimensionally “forgiving” with change in temperature. A significant difference in coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) between metals and glass results in excessive stress that can shatter glass or can cause a metal substrate to release from a glass carrier prematurely, losing its dimensional stability.
Another problem relates to surface quality of the substrate, also termed planarity. TFT fabrication requires that the substrate surface be extremely smooth, with no more than about 50 nm peak-to-peak roughness. However, this level of smoothness is extremely difficult to achieve without special tooling or other processing of the plastic. Even methods such as spin coating or other deposition techniques are not able to achieve smoothness at this level repeatably and at low cost.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2007/0091062 entitled “Active Matrix Displays and Other Electronic Devices Having Plastic Substrates” by French et al. describes forming a flexible substrate by first depositing substrate material onto a glass carrier plate, with an optional release layer between them. Then, once the substrate thickness is achieved, the exposed substrate surface can be treated for planarization, such as by adding one or more additional layers, and circuit components such as TFT arrays can be fabricated thereon. At the end of the component fabrication process, the substrate and its circuitry are then removable from the glass carrier, such as using a laser release process.
With methods such as those disclosed in the '1062 French et al. application, care must be taken to provide a highly smooth and uniform surface, using deposition methods such as spin coating, skiving with a blade, or various printing techniques. However, even with the use of spin coating and other highly precise deposition methods, the surface of the deposited substrate may still need further treatment steps to improve planarization before circuit lay-down can begin. This adds complexity and cost to the electronic device fabrication process.
Thus, it can be seen that although there has been great interest in developing and expanding the use of both plastics and metals as flexible substrates, the need for extra steps in surface treatment such as planarization remains.